Whether your interests lie in lighthouses or in the luminescent quality of a watercolor, Martha’s Vineyard Museum has something to offer this summer. The museum is open year-round and begins the summer season with an opening party on Friday, June 14 from 7 to 9 p.m. at 59 School street in Edgartown.
Maritime souvenirs from Vineyard mariners who sailed in the 19th and early 20th century are the subject of the exhibit A Taste for the Exotic: Mementos from Around the Globe. Whether they were chasing whales or shipping goods, the mariners collected items that documented their oceanic travels.
The exhibit opens on Friday, May 24, from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Martha’s Vineyard Museum, 59 School street in Edgartown.
Youngsters can travel back to the days when whalers and sailors engraved images on whale bone as part of the Edgartown Board of Trade’s Pink and Green Weekend. Since it is a Pink and Green Weekend, youngsters will carve their own scrimshaw art out of pink and green soap. The scrimshaw event is offered at the Martha’s Vineyard Museum Library, 59 School street in Edgartown, beginning at 10 a.m. on Saturday, May 11. Reservations are required for an accurate count of materials. Cost is $5 per child.
The Martha’s Vineyard Museum is hosting a reception tonight, March 15, for its latest spotlight gallery. These are short-term galleries devoted to rarely seen collections, new acquisitions and curators’ favorites. The latest spotlight was curated by the museum’s Facebook fans and Twitter followers. Over the past few weeks, these friends have voted on their favorite objects in the museum collection. The winners are now on exhibit.
Martha’s Vineyard Museum has received a $293,900 grant to make detailed descriptions of its collections searchable online, museum officials announced this week. The grant is the largest in the museum’s 90 year history, and builds on preservation work that has been supported by Community Preservation grants from five Island towns.
Plein Air is in the air. For the month of October the Martha’s Vineyard Museum and Arts Martha’s Vineyard are teaming up to celebrate creativity done outdoors. During the month various museum properties will be open for Island artists for a series of plein air sessions.
The keepers of Vineyard history are leaving the heart of the whaling community for a new home up-Island.
The Martha's Vineyard Historical Society this week announced the signing of a purchase and sale agreement for the Littlefield family's Scarecrow Farm, 25 acres tucked between the Agricultural Hall and Polly Hill Arboretum in West Tisbury.
The decision to abandon much of their campus on School street and leave Edgartown did not come easily for a 10-member board of directors that spent the last year assessing the society's current performance and future needs.
Historical Society Moves Ahead with $25 Million Building Plan
By JAMES KINSELLA
The Martha's Vineyard Historical Society is pursuing an
ambitious plan to triple its exhibition and storage space in a project
that could cost about $25 million.
Society executive director Matthew Stackpole yesterday said that, if
all goes according to plan, construction of the society's new
museum could begin on its property in West Tisbury in 2009, with an
opening in June 2010.
The Martha’s Vineyard Museum has named Dr. Keith Gorman, the museum’s director of programs and archivist and librarian, to the new position of museum director.
With the creation of the new position, Mr. Gorman will be responsible for the museum’s operations, programs, staff, capital campaign, and the proposed museum move from Edgartown to West Tisbury.
The oral history exhibit African American and Civil Rights Voices in the Gangway Gallery at the Martha’s Vineyard Museum is continually adding new voices. The exhibit, which opened in March of 2007, features photographic portraits and excerpts from interviews conducted by oral historian Linsey Lee with members of the Vineyard’s African American community and individuals involved in the civil rights movement. Three new voices have been recently added. Currently 14 individuals and their stories are included in the exhibit and more will be added in the coming months.
